Carl Hagelin (r.), now with Penguins, remains close with Mats Zuccarello. (Bill Kostroun/AP)

PITTSBURGH — Carl Hagelin and Mats Zuccarello will battle each other for pucks and playoff spots the next two months, but whether Hagelin prevails for the Penguins or Zuccarello triumphs for the Rangers, everyone watching should pause for a moment and consider this:

It is April 25, 2015, the day after Zuccarello has been hit in the head with a puck during Game 5 of the first round series against the Pens. He has a skull fracture, a brain contusion and brain bleeding. Hagelin, still a Ranger, and Derick Brassard walk into Zuccarello's hospital room. Hagelin can take it from there:

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"It was the day after it happened," Hagelin told the Daily News Wednesday morning at CONSOL Energy Center. "Me and Brass went to the team doctors and asked if it was OK to go see him. He had a family friend there taking care of him, too, a woman that I knew from before. So me and Brass walked in and he was in the intensive care unit, so you walk in you're like, 'Whoa.' You see people who are almost dead in there.

"So you walk in," Hagelin continued, "and you see him and he can't really move his mouth. Like he'll laugh and then only one side of his mouth is working, because he got hit on his left side of his head, which controls the right side of the body. And then when he was trying to talk nothing really came out, he'd say something and it was like "shhzzzz."

"You could see that he knew what was going on so he got frustrated, and then Brass broke down and then I broke down because of the whole mix of everything," Hagelin said. "It was an emotional day."

Zuccarello has never spoken about that day in English. He addressed it briefly in his native Norwegian language in Elin Flaglien's documentary for TV 2 Sports of Zuccarello's August charity trip to Tanzania.

"We sat there, three grown-up guys from (the) Rangers, and cried," Zuccarello said in translation. "I guess that was not that macho."

It's important not to forget, though, that Hagelin didn't just play 266 regular season games and 73 playoff games for the Rangers. He was — and always will be — one of them, due to friendships and moments like this.

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The Blueshirts have been one of the NHL's best teams since 2011 for several reasons, chief among them Henrik Lundqvist and a deep, stifling defense. But their close relationships and strong bonds have been equally as impactful, from rallying around Martin St. Louis after the death of his mom in 2014 to their tight everyday relationships that they trust and lean on in their toughest times.

Trading Hagelin to Anaheim last summer for salary cap considerations didn't only cost the Blueshirts a versatile, valuable player. It sent a key member of the club's close core elsewhere, even if it was only business.

"I think we clicked right away," Hagelin said of his friendship with Zuccarello. "I think he was with New York a year before I got called up, and then we played in the AHL together for a little bit. Then I got called up to the NHL; then he got called up. Then he came to see me in Sweden that summer and that's when we became good friends, and then we played together for three years.

"You create a bond obviously," Hagelin added. "I drove him to the rink every day. We had similar interests, and obviously speaking the same language usually brings people together."

Hagelin said he and Zuccarello speak Swedish together, since Zuccarello is fluent and Norwegians typically cross over to the Swedish language better than Swedes learn theirs. They remain friends and have kept in touch throughout the season even with Hagelin being traded to division rival Pittsburgh in January.

Wednesday night is the first of four Rangers-Penguins showdowns through March 27, each critical in the Eastern Conference playoff race. But while Hagelin fights for a new side, he also still reflects on how "happy" he is to see Zuccarello recovered fully from that frightening injury and continuing his NHL career.

"It was good to see this year he had a good start," Hagelin said. "He skated when we went to his charity game (in Norway in late June), but that didn't mean he was ready to go. And that day after (the injury) when you saw him (in the hospital), you felt like it was gonna be hard for him to do anything.

"He basically had a stroke and some people don't recover from that," Hagelin said, recalling the emotional scene one last time. "But he did a great job, got his speech back … I'm happy he's fine now."